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We found Rocky Mountain’s Element RSL to be one of the lightest, stiffest, full-suspension cross-country racing bikes on the market. The 26in Element was developed in the crucible of World Cup racing, and now Rocky Mountain have taken lessons learned building the 26in model and applied them to a new 29in variant.

The new Element 29 RSL looks just as promising as the 26in models have proven.

The new Element 29 RSL line will be available for sale early this fall, in five sizes, ranging from US$4,099 to $7,999.

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Rocky Mountain's new Element 29 RSL line — big wheeled race rockets

The proven: SmoothLink, ABC, SmoothWall

The new Element 29 RSL line incorporates Rocky Mountain’s SmoothLink suspension design — which aligns the lower link parallel to the Average Chain Torque line to isolate the active suspension system from tension on the chain, and subsequently eliminate pedal-induced suspension movement. SmoothLink also offers minimal chain growth, just 8mm, and Rocky Mountain tune the linkage to offer a rising rate curve that, they say, offers the bike a bottomless feel. All of the 29in Elements feature 95mm of rear wheel travel.

Rocky Mountain also carry over their ABC pivot system, which is bushing based and offers unique angular-contact polymer bushings. They say the system is much stiffer than systems relying on standard bearings, and our experience with ABC — when testing the 26in Element — seems to support this claim. Rocky Mountain use ABC pivots in six locations and claim a 120g weight savings over traditional hardware.

A sag indicator is built into the top tube pivot:

Sag gradients on the upper swing link

Finally there’s the carbon construction, which Rocky Mountain call SmoothWall. They describe it as a proprietary, high-modulus molding method that uses an inner mandrel to best shape the frame tubing’s walls.

Along with the proprietary molding, Rocky Mountain offer a number of carbon-specific features, including a net-molded head tube that accepts bearings directly, and an all-carbon press-fit BB-92 bottom bracket. The drive-side chain stay incorporates a stainless steel guard, and above, the seat post clamp is sealed with a rubber gasket, which says a lot about where Rocky Mountain ride their bikes.

The big obstacle to overcome in creating the 29in Element line, say Rocky Mountain, was geometry. When Rocky Mountain started in on their 29in redesign projects — beginning with Vertex — the industry was all over the place about 29er geometry, with vast ranges in head-tube angle, different fork offsets, not to mention intense focus on low bottom brackets and short chain stays.

Rocky Mountain's goal was simple in concept: make the 29in models ride like their 26in equivalents. Alex Cogger, Rocky Mountain’s lead product manager, stressed that making a smart handling bike isn’t about nailing the trendy specs, rather the whole package. He said that Rocky Mountain built six aluminum test mules and equipped them with Cane Creek AngleSets to prove out much of the geometry, including head-tube angle and cockpit dimensions.

The tenants of the Rocky Mountain Elements’ design include a slightly higher bottom bracket, middle of the road head angle, as well as shorter cockpit, chain stays and wheelbase.

The higher bottom bracket serves to reorient the rider further over the rear wheel. This aids in lifting the front wheel over obstacles and when manualing or for wheelies. This move also allows better placement of the front derailleur, which in turn allowed the shorter (445mm) chain stays.

Rocky then settled on the slacker/mid-range head tube angle, but paired it with a standard fork offset. The slacker head angle — 70.6° — allows them to shorten the top tube, again aiding in the bike’s 26in feel, but avoid toe overlap. Why 70.6°, you may wonder? Well that’s a static angle, so when a rider sets the proper sag, roughly 20-percent, the angle becomes 70.25°, which is the same as the Vertex hard tail. Note that these angles refer to a 100mm travel fork, bumping to 120mm — a la Element 970 BC Edition — kicks the head angle out another half degree or so.

The new Element features a 12x142mm rear through-axle, which will be compatible with Shimano’s new direct-mount rear derailleur. “It unclutters that area,” Cogger told BikeRadar of the new interface. “You can just clunk the wheel in place, and it opens up the area a bit more so it becomes much easier to get the wheel in and out.”

While a standard derailleur hanger is shown, the new Elements will fit Shimano's new direct-mount Shadow derailleur hanger

The SmoothWall frame is also molded with internal cable routing for all of its cables including a rear shock remote and dropper post — the flagship Element 999 comes with RockShox Monarch XX with a hydraulic remote — the latter option is for standard dropper posts, not RockShox’s internally routed Reverb Stealth.

Rocky Element 999 RSL

Rocky mountain element 999 rsl:

Element 999 RSL is the flagship of the line and equipped to go straight to the World Cup racecourse. The US$7,999 bike is fully equipped with SRAM’s SID and Monarch XX suspension components, both of which use hydraulic lockouts. SRAM also provide a full XX group for the bike’s drivetrain and braking systems, while Race Face take care of the cockpit, and a DT Swiss X1.4 wheelset completes the package.

The Element 970 BC Edition ($5,199) is an interesting bird. It trades out the Shimano components for a, mostly, SRAM X9 package. It’s one of Rocky’s two, lower tier, Elements equipped with a FORM 7005 aluminum rear triangle. It does include a RockShox Reverb dropper post and Fox Talas (120-90mm travel adjust fork) with the package, which appear to be the main differences from the ‘standard’ Elements, which all feature fixed 100mm travel front ends.

The Element 950 RSL qualifies as the base model at $4,099, however, its spec and price still put it well within the enthusiasts’ category. Highlights include the Fox Float Dual Remote, which operates both front and rear dampers. The transmission and brakes are mostly SLX — substitute XT rear derailleur — and the wheels are Wheeltech’s Inferno model.